Violent deaths show global drop despite spike in battlefield deaths

Yarmouk camp, Syria. UN Photo (file)

An estimated one in four violent deaths happen in 18 countries that make up only four per cent of the world's population, a UN-sponsored report showed Friday.

The findings, from UN Development Programme (UNDP) partner the Small Arms Survey, found that despite a small drop in violent deaths to 508,000, conflict-related deaths have risen to at least 70,000 per year.

The figures have been fuelled by fighting in Syria and Libya, but also by drug wars in a South American triangle of Honduras, Guatemala and Venezuela, as Small Arms Survey's Anna Alvazzi del Frate told Daniel Johnson.